Whatever It Takes
by SunnyStorms
Summary: The war didn't end with Hogwarts, and with each mounting death, boundaries blur and lines are crossed. When Voldemort presents Ginny with two impossible choices, will she be able to find her own way out or will it all prove in vain?


**A/N:** For this story, I took an AU approach to the battle at Hogwarts, so Voldemort didn't die at Harry's hands and some Order members are still alive while in canon Rowling killed them off during the final battle. The Fidelius Charm was re-cast so that the Order can use their old headquarters again. I wrote this just letting the prompt take me wherever it decided to go, and it wasn't someplace that ended in rainbows and a sunset. So just a heads up about that.

* * *

Somewhere in the ancient house, a grandfather clock tolled the twelve deep, hollow notes of midnight.

Ginny gave up on the pretense of sleep. Instead, she crept from the tiny room allotted to her and made her way down the creaky stairs of number twelve, Grimmauld Place. Her wanderings led her eventually to the drawing room whose windows overlooked the street. She unlatched one of them and pulled up the sash. A cool breeze wafted into the room. For a while, she simply stood still, drinking in the fresh air with her eyes closed to the sight of masked figures patrolling below.

It had been months since she was allowed outside—not since the battle at Hogwarts had ended in a costly stalemate. Though the danger was undoubtedly real, she'd grown to resent the forced lockdown, but the Order wouldn't budge and wouldn't allow her to pass the burden of her secret on to anyone else. She knew why. They considered her the least valuable of their members where fieldwork was concerned. If someone had to be hidden away for the good of everyone else, it might as well have been her—not yet of age and still only a child in their eyes.

None of that mattered anymore. Her every gripe and resentment paled like stars at dawn in the light of her sickening realization the previous morning. She gritted her teeth at the memory, hands clenched to the point of pain.

Her stupidity, her utter foolishness had returned to haunt her a thousand times over, but there was nothing she could do about it. Nothing except—No. Ginny hugged herself tighter and begged forgiveness for even having thought of the option.

A crack of Apparition came from outside followed by a pounding on the door. Jolted from her thoughts, she rushed downstairs in time to see her brother Charlie stumbling into the hallway. Light from the flickering gas lamps illuminated his wide-eyed, blood-and-dirt streaked face. Shacklebolt, who'd opened the door, caught Charlie and stopped him from pitching forward onto the floor.

Panic whipped through her, and she nearly tripped in her rush down the last remaining steps.

"Merlin, what happened?" cried Shacklebolt. "You weren't scheduled for any mission tonight."

"Mum," Charlie gasped out, "my mum. They got to her."

The strength in her legs dissipated like smoke, and she crashed to the floor.

_No._ The word played like a broken record in her head. She repeated it out loud, "No, you're wrong. Dad is their Secret-Keeper, and he would have never, ever betrayed her." She swallowed hard to keep the hysteria at bay, but her brother's response hardly helped to calm her down.

In all her life, she'd never seen Charlie look so lost. "I don't know. I don't know anything. Dad was out on an assignment tonight. I thought I'd check up on her, but when I arrived, they were already in the yard. I tried, but I c-couldn't stop them."

A wet sheen coated his eyes as her own began to blur. Other Order members had trickled into the hallway and were discussing urgently among themselves, but she couldn't focus on their words long enough for anything to make sense. Instead, her attention became fixated on the dark liquid pooling on the floor below her brother's feet.

Before she could cry out for help, Madam Pomfrey was already at his side.

"They had a message for us," Charlie rasped out as Madam Pomfrey cut open his blood-soaked garments to inspect the injury. Nausea rose in Ginny's throat, but she couldn't look away.

"Unless it's urgent, you'd best take it easy, boy," Madam Pomfrey warned.

Charlie shook his head. "I'll live. They meant for me to live," he finished bitterly.

"What is it then?" asked Shacklebolt.

Her brother started to reply, but then his eyes caught sight of her, and he swiftly snapped his jaw shut. Knowing what was to come, she glared defiantly back at the adults around her.

"Ginny—"

She promptly cut Shacklebolt off. "She's my mum too. I deserve to know."

Lupin stared sympathetically back at her. "I know you're worry, child, but—"

"I'm not a child anymore," she yelled at them. "I'd be out there fighting too if you would only let me!"

Shacklebolt's expression turned stern, and she knew she'd lost all hope of winning them over. But before she could be lectured, Lupin gently cut in. "You have every right to be upset, Ginny. I know it must be frustrating for you to feel that you're unable to help, but remember that you have an equally vital role in all of this. Sometimes the decision _not_ to act is just as important and just as difficult to carry out. You want the same thing all of us do, which is to put an end to You-Know-Who's terror."

Of course she did, but sometimes, she wondered if the world would even be worth coming back to after all this was over.

"We all have to do what it takes to win this war, and we can't afford to take any chances. I'm sorry, Ginny, but I hope you can understand."

Before they could see her tears fall, she spun around without another word and stomped back up the stairs. Not only did they keep her locked up in the house, but they also kept her in the dark about everything. Except this time, it was about her mum's life, and no way in hell would she simply stand by.

Back in her cramped little room, she flung a locking spell at the door and soundproof the space before pulling aside her trunk and prying open the loose floorboard it covered. With shaking hands, she reached into the dark, dusty space and pulled out a small wooden box. She set it upon the bed and climbed up to sit cross-legged from it.

She shouldn't have kept it, should have smashed it when everything else had gone to pieces. The Order would certainly have destroyed it. _Take no chances_ was the hardened rule they all now lived by.

Even though there had been no more use for it, and even though she'd told herself she never wanted to see it again, she had stupidly been unable to get rid of the thing—her last remaining link to him. Ginny's bitter laughter broke the uneasy silence of the room. How naive she had been, only to then find out that they were linked in an even more substantial, irrevocable way, but that wasn't what mattered right now.

With a deep breath, she reached for the lid of the box and tossed it aside. Inside, the silver compact gleamed as new as the day she'd received it. She picked it up between trembling fingers while struggling to keep her emotions in check.

_It was over_, she reminded herself. The lines had been drawn in blood, irretrievable. This was merely a business transaction now. The Order members wouldn't tell her, but he would know. And if he'd taken part in any of it, then she was prepared to hate him with every ounce of her being.

Inhaling deeply to steel herself, Ginny flipped open the compact. Her reflection stared back at her—gaunt and pale, more ghost than girl.

With another shaky breath, she brought the mirror closer to her face and whispered, "Draco Malfoy."

For a minute, nothing happened, and she felt ten times the fool to have even thought he would've kept the mirror's partner.

_You're a bloody idiot, Ginny Weasley._

But then the mirror fogged over, and her heart leapt into her throat. Her reflection faded out, replaced by a face more reptilian than man. Ginny screamed and dropped the mirror.

It fell softly back onto the sheets, still open, as she scrambled backwards towards the headboard. The sibilant voice from her nightmares seeped from the compact and coiled around her like a live serpent.

Presently, it was laughing at her, a laughter unmistakably tinged with malice.

"I knew you wouldn't be able to resist," the voice hissed.

_Him_. It was _him_.

Her breath came rapid and shallow. _Calm down_, she told herself_. It's just a mirror. He's not actually here._As the initial shock wore off, other panicked thoughts jumped to the surface of her mind. Why did _he_ have the mirror? What did that mean for Draco? What the hell was she supposed to do now?

"Not who you were expecting was it? Oh, he's still very much alive, but I'm not sure you'll want to see him once you've heard the full story."

It was that awful laughter again. Ginny swallowed hard. _For Mum, I have to do this for Mum._

"He could rot for all I care. That goes for the rest of the scum who worship you. My mum, what have you done with her? I know what you want, and if you hurt her, I'll take it to the grave, I swear it." With each word, her voice grew stronger, but still she left the compact where it lay, opened to the ceiling.

"A bit of an impudent brat, aren't you? Here's a tip, little girl. You can only negotiate if your opponent believes that you hold the right cards in your hand. Unfortunately for you, I've got them all, and you have none. Make no mistake," he snarled, his voice sharpening to a razor's edge. "I'll win this either way, whether sooner or later."

"You can't fool me," she flung back, channeling every shred of hate she could muster for the monster speaking to her. "You can still lose, and you know it. Why else would you've gone through all the effort?"

On the other side of the mirror, something exploded, and someone screamed. She cringed, but when he spoke again, his voice was deathly calm. "You can delude yourself all you like, Ginevra Weasley, but make no mistake, the rebels' days are numbered. I'm offering you a golden opportunity here, so listen closely. I know your side paints me as some blood-thirsty monster, but by your foolish insistence on continuing this needless war, you're all equally guilty in the bloodshed that continues."

"How dare—"

"There's a timer on your mother's life. If you insist on interrupting me, that will only take precious time from her. It's your choice."

There was nothing she could do but bite back her tongue and fume in silence.

"Very good, I knew you would see things my way. Where was I? Ah, yes. Regardless of what you've been mislead to believe, my goal has always been to save the wizarding world from the wretched path it had already begun to spiral into. In that interest, I'd rather this end sooner than later, don't you agree? Think about it carefully, little girl. What would all this fighting be worth if everything you knew was destroyed and if everyone you loved ended up dead?"

With every reported casualty of the war, that same thought had rung loudly in her head, but the reality of it being spoken by him only sickened her further. He spoke of a revolting truth she could no longer firmly deny. In this nightmare world their lives had turned into, honor and goodness, right and wrong had begun to lose meaning. Their edges blurred and became less defined, but she clung onto the conviction that there were lines that should never be crossed.

As if he'd read her mind, he continued on, speaking with artful indulgence, "Don't be a fool, girl. Good and evil is but a rhetoric your side uses to convince their followers that their misguided cause is worth fighting for. I am hoping you will rise above that. That said, here's what I'm proposing, and it's only a one time deal. You hand over the secret you're keeping pertaining to Harry Potter's whereabouts and his plans, and in turn I'll grant amnesty to your entire family and yourself in the new order. Despite their crimes against the government, none of them nor yourself will be harmed while we put an end to this war—captured if needed should the more stubborn of you insist on fighting, but not maimed, nor will you be persecuted when the war ends."

"Right, like I'm going to believe _you_ of all people," she snapped.

"Oh, it'll be a magically binding agreement. You won't need to worry about that."

"And if I refuse?"

Impossibly, a chill seemed to radiate from the compact as he replied. "Then your mother dies, and it'll be directly your decision that led to her death. Remember also that eventually everyone you care about will die as well if this war continues. Dwell on _that_. You have three days to decide."

She slumped against the headboard, stunned. Minutes later, after she'd finally hid the compact once again, fear and dread and the impossible weight of her situation combined to send her running to the bathroom and heaving into the toilet bowl.

"Ginny."

She looked up into the worried eyes of Charlie. Silently, he wet a hand towel and handed it to her. When she finished cleaning off her mouth, he'd kneeled beside her on the bathroom floor and pulled her into a hug.

"Don't worry, Ginny. We'll do everything to get her back." But she knew it was a lie. They wouldn't even know where to look, and they would only have three days. She knew now what Charlie's message must have been and knew what the Order's decision would be. For no single person would the Order jeopardize their entire cause.

Black. White. Good. Evil. Right. Wrong. What did any of it mean any more?

"What about Dad?" she asked into her brother's shoulder.

He pulled back and shook his head. "That's the good news. Dad's fine. I mean, of course, not _fine_, but he's downstairs debating what to do with the rest of the Order right now. I know you hate being kept out of the meetings, so I'll at least tell you what I'm allowed to. Since Dad hadn't been captured, they're worried that the Death Eaters have found a way to circumvent the Fidelius Charm, but if that's true, they would've stormed here already. Here's the more bizarre bit. Dad's assignment tonight was to defend against a raid we'd gotten wind of. After the fight was over, he found a note someone had slipped into his robe warning against using any Weasleys as Secret-Keepers. So maybe that had something to do with how they got to Mum—_if_ the warning came from someone sympathetic to our cause, but it could also very well be misdirection on the Death Eaters' part. Some Order members want to move headquarters, just in case, or at the very least to move you somewhere new, but others think this is just some ploy to get you while you're in transit between places. It's an absolute mess."

That was an understatement, but at the very least she had one less family member to worry about. "Thanks for checking up on me, Charlie, but I'll manage. You go do what you can for Mum."

He nodded, but still insisted on accompanying her to her room. She let him tuck her into bed as if she was a little girl again, but as soon as he closed the door behind him, she bolted upright. Three days. That was all she had to find a way around two impossible choices. But how to even begin?

The more she tried to think, the harder it became to fight off her exhaustion. Trails of thoughts diverged into tangents. Words eluded her until finally, against her own will, sleep claimed her, and for the first time in months, she dreamed of him.

_Strands of platinum-blond hair framed a pale, angular face. Grey eyes that glowed silver by candlelight, stared livid at her._

"_Why did you let him kiss you?" he demanded._

_She sighed. It probably hadn't been the wisest idea to bring up that incident just now. "I didn't_let_him. It just happened all of a sudden. I couldn't just push him off in front of everyone. Some people were already suspicious. That would've only confirmed it for them. And I already told you it didn't mean anything." She scooted closer to him on the bed and kissed him, hoping to placate him as she had no energy for another of their typical row tonight._

_He reciprocated all too willingly for a while before pulling back. "Let me remind you that I don't share. If you _ever_ betray me, I will pay you back tenfold. I promise you that."_

"_It's cute that you think you can threaten me. And may I remind you of what led to this?"_

"_Why you—"_

_She laughed as he tackled her onto the covers, swallowing her giggles with his possessive kiss._

_The scene dissolved into mist. She was back in the cavernous Chamber again, running and slipping on pools of blood, Tom's voice whispering treacherously in her head._

"_There's no escape."_

_She spun towards the voice, but it wasn't Tom._

"_Draco! You don't have to do this," she screamed._

_He shook his head and stepped closer to her, gleaming knife in hand. His eyes were wrong. Too wide. Too dark. Twin pairs of a gaping abyss._

"_Our choices were taken from us long ago," he whispered, but it echoed deafeningly through the Chamber all the same._

_She tried to pick up her feet to run, but the blood seemed to have taken on properties of glue, holding her fast. When he was only a foot away, the world tilted around her. A sudden pain pierced her stomach, and she clutched at it screaming as her sight bled into black._

The pale light of dawn filled her vision as Ginny jolted awake, gasping. _Just a dream. It's just a dream._Still she recalled it all too vividly, but as the images repeated relentlessly in her head along with the events of earlier that morning, a positively insane idea took hold. It was questionable, definitely, but there were no other options to dwell upon.

She rushed to the library and called for Kreacher. He appeared in an instant, all too eager these days to help out.

"Kreacher, do you know if the Blacks had any books on protection charms concerning bonds through blood? The sort that deal with Dark Magic. Nothing that would be common knowledge."

The house-elf bobbed his head up and down fervently. "Yes, Kreacher knows." He snapped his fingers and several dusty tomes flew off the shelves.

She thanked him and carried the ancient books back to her room. The rest of the morning was spent skimming through their contents. By noon, she'd chucked the last of the tomes at the wall in frustration.

"Kreacher!" she called again. When he appeared, she asked frantically, "Do you know of any more? Some of these had references to what I'm looking for, but I need the specific spells."

He shook his head with downcast eyes. "Kreacher knows but cannot get them."

Her heart hammered in her chest. "What? What do you mean?"

"Mistress hid them, so they would not be taken. Only Blacks can open the seal."

"B-but if a person was a Black, do you know how they would get a hold of the books?"

"Yes, Kreacher knows."

"Then please show me."

"But you cannot do it, missus."

"T-there's some Black in me yet. It might just work."

"Kreacher thinks not. In the past, maybe, but now your blood is too diluted."

She fought back her frustration, knowing that getting upset with him would only be counterproductive. "Please show me anyway."

He looked skeptically at her but eventually shrugged and led the way back to the library. Once there, she followed him to an unadorned section of the wall between two bookcases.

"Now what?"

"Next part is very messy. Kreacher does not think you should do it."

She bit back her exasperation. "I'll be fine, Kreacher. Go on."

He squirmed but then said, "You must cut your hand so that it bleeds. Put it against the wall and speak the family motto."

She cringed. Trust the Blacks to hide their stash with the crudest of blood magic. Without further hesitation, she sliced her palm with her wand. Feeling utterly ridiculous, she planted the bloodied palm against the wall and muttered, "Toujours Pur_._"

Nothing happened until Kreacher corrected her pronunciation, and she tried again. This time with a soft crack, the outline of a rectangular panel appeared in the peeling wallpaper, centered around where her palm was pressed against the wall. Seconds later, the panel disappeared altogether, revealing a deep hollow space beyond.

Kreacher looked back at her in awe. "You did it, missus! The house recognizes you as a true Black."

The words brought her no comfort. Quickly she healed her hand and reached for the ancient books piled up in the hollowed out space.

Ginny read right through lunch and only paused to ask Kreacher for a sandwich when hunger pangs became too distracting. As usual, busy with their own Order business, no one once bothered her or had the time to check up on her, and for once, she was glad for it.

By mid-afternoon, she'd found the explicit directions for the spell, but had to hastily back away as unbidden, the tears fell in big, fat droplets that threatened to smear the hand-written pages. Instead of fighting it, she curled up in bed and let it all out. It would be the last time.

It really hadn't been over, she realized, until that very moment, until the proof of his ultimate betrayal stared out at her in the careful black script written ages ago. She never knew either, that hating someone could hurt so much.

As the last of her tears dried, there was one more thing she knew—a part of her had been irrevocably lost. That silver-eyed boy she loved was gone. Her acceptance of that fact settled in her gut like a steadfast anchor, whether grounding her or sinking her, she couldn't tell. And that naïve Ginny Weasley who'd foolishly fallen in love with him, she was gone too.

The Ginny, who was no longer Ginny, wiped the last of the sticky tearstains from her cheeks, and with a body that suddenly felt alien to her, she copied out the requisite spell. The required materials weren't the worst of it, all things considered. Even 'blood of an enemy' wouldn't be hard to come by given that they were in the midst of a war. No, the most forbidden part was the very premise of the spell—blood betraying blood. By its nature, its execution would be unstable and unreliable with high risk of unintended consequences for the caster. The book warned of such dangers—insanity, phantom pains, and permanent black stains upon the soul.

But choices were no longer something she had. Ginny Weasley was a cog in the machinery of Fate, nothing more.

She left off the warnings in the copied spell and dropped the books off in the library. At dinner that night, she presented it to the Order members in attendance. Following her explanation, a constant barrage of questions ricocheted around the room.

"But this isn't possible! If it actually worked, surely such a circumvention to the Fidelius Charm would be better known," her brother George exclaimed again for what was possibly the tenth time.

"Ah, but the magic concerning bonds is an understudied area overall," said McGonagall.

Lupin was next to add his ruminations to the collective pot. "If it does exist, it appears to work similar to the magic concerning wizarding debts, except in this case, the circumstances in which it could be invoked are even rarer. Family would tend not to betray their own in such an extensive manner where life and death was concerned, and it doesn't work if feelings were hostile to begin with, so those who would be inclined to betray their own kin would have no use for the spell. As detailed here, it doesn't work if coercion is involved either. But Ginny, surely you aren't suggesting that one of your own family betrayed your mother?"

She shook her head and stonily replied, "It was me."

Her father reached with his hand to feel her forehead. "Gin-bug, are you feeling alright?"

She shrugged off his hand and pushed onwards with her explanation. "I didn't do it directly, but it was because of me."

The faces around her continued to look concern. She dragged a frustrated hand through her hair. There was no way to cushion the news. If they didn't believe her, they wouldn't go through with her proposed plan.

"I know Draco Malfoy was involved. We have the requisite bond between us. I only brought this up in the first place because we can turn it right around and use it against him. I know the perfect target that would gain us the necessary bargaining chip to get my mum back."

Shock registered on the faces around her, and she felt herself burning up with humiliation under the stare of a dozen pairs of eyes scrutinizing her.

"I don't quite understand," said Charlie. "How could you and Malfoy have the necessary familial bond?"

She took a deep breath and admitted, "For a while, we...dated, secretly of course, even before this whole mess of a war began."

"That might well be, but still, how could..."

Realization slowly dawned on everyone else in the room and with it shock mingled with pity. Too many eyes darted from her face to stare at the portion of the table that hid her stomach from view. She couldn't stand a minute more of it.

"Narcissa Malfoy is our target. Come get me when you get a team together and all the required materials." With that last directive, she stood up abruptly and left for her room, the food on her plate untouched.

Minutes later, a warmed tray of her uneaten dinner was sent to her room. Her dad, her brothers, and a few other Order members came up one by one to offer her assurances that none of it was her fault, that no one blamed her, that she shouldn't be too hard on herself. She accepted their hugs and awkward pats on her back, pacifying them with empty assurances of her own well-being, but the only thing that mattered to her in the moment was how much longer it would be until they were ready to set off.

By nine o'clock that night, everything was in order. Some Order members had been against the whole ordeal, fearing a trap had been set up specifically for her, but she swayed them by presenting the same non-choice Fate had given her. If they didn't act, Molly Weasley would die. They settled instead for extreme precautions including extensively scouting the area with Polyjuice versions of herself once she'd used the bond to confirm the location of Narcissa Malfoy. Under Disillusionment Charms and accompanied by a near dozen other Order members, she was whisked to the site for the minimal time required to perform the requisite spell. Once the Protection Charms were broken and the traps were dismantled, the cottage occupants, one witch and a house-elf, were quickly subdued. When the entire plan had gone off without a hitch, Ginny knew with certainty that he had never expected to be betrayed by her. While she had half expected to feel a twinge of remorse, none came. That Ginny was gone, she reminded herself, and really, could it even be called a betrayal if he'd already done it to her?

For the rest of the night, she waited in bed, the silver compact clutched in her hands. She hadn't informed the Order of this specific detail of the plan. Not that it mattered. However he made contact with them, ultimately the one he sought would be her.

Sometime in the early morning, the compact buzzed in her hand, jolting her from her half slumber. She opened it cautiously, but it was an angry pair of grey eyes that stared back at her, though in the first moment that they caught each other's gaze, some other emotion altogether flitted across his face. She wondered what her own expression might have been, but the moment passed, and anger was all that remained.

"How could you?" he hissed at her.

"Nothing you haven't already done," she snarled right back. "Let's cut to the chase, Malfoy. Bring my mum safely back to us, and you'll get yours back."

"How many times have I had to tell you?" She'd never seen him so close to losing control over his emotions. "I have no choice in this, none."

Once upon a time, she would've insisted that he did, that there was a right and a wrong path if he'd only had the courage to follow through. But now? "I don't have a choice either. Find a way, or this will be the costliest stalemate both of us will have to endure."

He shook his head, and she was shock to see the wet sheen curtaining his eyes. "What I could, I did for you. You should have never crossed this line. I never wanted it to come to this, but it's too late."

"What? What did you do, Draco? What could possibly be worse than—" Shouts and explosions came from the floor below her.

"I did nothing. Your foolish Order brought this on themselves for bringing a Black into your fold. Blood magic is nothing to trifle with, but you'll be safe. They promised me at least that, and if you'll only listen, your family will be too. Stop them while you still can, Ginny. It's not worth it."

As the sounds of fighting grew louder, hysterical laughter built and bubbled up uncontrollably out of her. If this as how it was to end, then she knew without a doubt what her decision would be. "If they go down, I will go down with them, you heartless bastard," she shrieked at him. The compact flew through the air and crashed against the wall. Slivers of glass went flying as the room filled with his cries.

"Don't be stupid, Ginny! Ginny, stop! Just listen, _damn it_."

With her wand gripped tightly in her hand, she Silenced the room before barging out into the hallway.

-oOo-

"Malfoy? I thought you were staying out of this one."

"My mother, is she alright? And the Weasley girl, have you seen her? Has she been captured?"

"No in regards to the girl. That's why everyone's on edge. Your mother lost a lot of blood in order to break the Fidelius Charm, but she's doing fine. Anyway, they're scouring the house right now. If the girl is gone or dead, he'll have our heads."

"_Shite_." He ran through the house like a madman, panic stabbing through his gut with every shock of Weasley red hair encountered in a still body. Too damn many.

_Not her. Not her. It can't be her._

Loud swearing came from the end of yet another hallway.

"Who cast the Killing Curse? Who?" He recognized the angry voice as Dolohov's.

"N-no one. None of us. Sh-She...d-did..."

_No._ He stumbled into the room where a handful of Death Eaters had gathered. Shelves of books cluttered the walls, and at the far end, away from the cluster of robed and masked figures, a slim form lay crumpled across the floor, her brilliant hair spilled in red streaks across her body. He crashed to his knees beside her, his cry lodged in his throat.

His hands found no breath nor a pulse. Looking around for anything to deny the reality before him, he spied the book opened near her flung out hand. The page title caught his attention, and he read on with mounting dread.

A memory floated to the forefront of his mind.

"_Do this for me, Draco, and I will offer her a chance at life. You know it is only inevitable that her side will lose in the end."_

_It was the closest the Dark Lord had ever come to asking something from him. The Dark Lord was not someone who asked, he only needed to command. Yet Draco dared not question this oddity outright. "But my Lord, how could this work?"_

"_Do not concern yourself with the details. I will only offer this once, so choose wisely. She'll hate you for it of course, but you_care_for her don't you? Surely her anger is nonetheless worth her life?"_

_Of course it was. Everything in his power, he did for her. That he'd ultimately thrown in his lot with the Dark Lord was as much for his own family as it was for her. He was no fool. He knew who would ultimately win in the end._

"_I'll do it."_

There in the handwritten page, he recognized down to the detail the spell he'd been asked to perform, but for the first time, he learned about the mechanism behind it.

It worked because of a special bond between them, the Dark Lord had said, but he had never gone into further detail. And now Draco knew all too well.

The world around him seemed to freeze up and splinter into a million insignificant pieces. He felt at once empty as a void and yet racked by an inconceivable pain that pierced soul-deep. He choked up, clawing at his throat as he suffocated from the rush of everything that went unsaid trying to exit all at once. An inhuman cry pierced his ear before the shocked realization that the sound came from him put a stop to it.

The babble of other voices reached his ear, but he could make out nothing except for his own frantic whisper as he clutched at her prone body. "Oh God, no. Ginny, no. I didn't know. Forgive me. _Please_, forgive me."

* * *

**Author Notes:**This was written for the Seven Devils Competition on the HPFC forum. My lyric prompt was "I'm gonna raise the stakes." I used it in the context of the other lyrics to inform the piece, but I'm not all too sure how well the connection comes across. I didn't spell some things out too explicitly here but hoped I dropped enough clues that it still got across. If things confused you, please do let me know. It'll help give me a guideline as to what to go back and elaborate on.


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